Art collector and campaigner Markus Lawrence said his reputation and years of community work in Reading had been destroyed after a BBC news story raised questions about the provenance of what he says is a Vincent van Gogh painting

It is a tale as turbulent as the life of the artist whose painting has caused controversy in the town.

Art collector and campaigner Markus Lawrence said his reputation and years of community work in Reading had been destroyed after a BBC news story raised questions about the provenance of what he says is a Vincent van Gogh painting.

And he has suspended all donations to the webpage set up to raise cash for a gallery to house his inherited art collection.

An emotional Mr Lawrence spoke to getreading yesterday, days after he came clean about the origin of the oil on canvas he loaned for display at the launch of the town’s Open for Art weekend on Friday last week.

‘House at Auvers II’ took pride of place on the wall of Picnic cafe in Market Place for just over an hour to herald the inaugural festival, organised by arts organisation jelly and supported by Reading UK CIC, Reading Business Improvement District and The Cultural Partnership.

Mr Lawrence said it was a genuine work by the artist, bought by his great-grandfather in Paris in the 1920s, which he then inherited.

However, after media coverage of the event, a van Gogh specialist David Brooks, from Toronto, Canada, said it was not a known work. The Dutch artist’s work can only be officially confirmed by the eponymous museum in Amsterdam and the museum reportedly said it had only received an email from Mr Lawrence on Monday.

Mr Lawrence disputes this and told getreading he had contacted it in 2013.

Then in the BBC’s follow-up story, the 27-year-old, who said he never set out to deceive anyone, admitted he had in fact bought the work for £1,500 about two years ago and the reference to Paris came from an inscription on the back of the painting.

He told getreading: “I very stupidly didn’t correct the [initial] statement after it had been published.

“I didn’t have much confidence in myself in finding pieces and anyone taking it seriously. I made a mistake.

“And I didn’t want the [BBC] person who recorded it to get into trouble.”

He added: “I wanted to be honest about the mistake and they’ve turned that against me. In my belief it’s by him [van Gogh].”

Mr Lawrence has been nominated for a Pride of Reading award in the Cultural Contribution category for his Kickstarter campaign to raise £50,000 to fund a new Reading Gallery, to be known as The RG, and bring his family’s 200-strong art collection out of storage for public view. These include work by Picasso, Rembrandt and a version of Munch’s The Scream.

The project had so far gained 31 backers on the crowdsourcing website, pledging a total of £5,907 towards the goal, before Mr Lawrence switched off the function to donate late afternoon yesterday. He said no-one would be out of pocket because these were just pledges and not yet debited.

“When it was on display I never said it was 100 per cent authentic, I hadn’t said it had been authenticated; we would be working with the Van Gogh Museum,” he said.

“They even said I wouldn’t comment on how much it was worth. They [BBC] just wanted the ‘£million van Gogh in the cafe’ story.

“They are destroying my character. I’ve dedicated hundreds of hours of my life to charity work and I’ve worked my a*** off to build this gallery and they’re turning everyone against me.”

Mr Lawrence, who is also a trustee for Reading-based LGBT charity Support U, fears he will have to step down from the role.

“The charity is the most important thing and I don’t want the charity to be damaged,” he said.

He added: “All I did was try to enhance the town I was born in and the people that live here and they are destroying that.”

Painted in May 1890, the oil on canvas Houses of Auvers II is believed to have been painted during one of Van Gogh’s emotional outbursts, just two months before his suicide.

Pictures of Mr Lawrence’s family now removed from the Reading Gallery website

However, it’s not just the masterpiece that has caused scratched heads, so to are two black and white images on the Reading Gallery website purporting to be members of the Wetten family.

In one, it claims to show Mr Lawrence’s grandfather Vivian as a boy, while in another, it is captioned as Vivian as a baby with his sister Kathleen. However, an internet image search brought both images up with a different provenance with the latter labelled as ‘free vintage clip art’.

Mr Lawrence said he was not involved in the uploading of the images on the website but would find out.

He did not get back with any information at the time of going to press but both images had been removed from the site yesterday late afternoon.

He also said he would be releasing a statement yesterday but nothing was received at the time of going to press.

A BBC spokeswoman said: “We are confident that this is a fair representation of the situation and adheres to our strict editorial guidelines.”